ELF vs VULCAN
by crystalblood
Summary: Bones and Jim discuss old twentieth-century literature as it pertains to Vulcan culture. Spock is not amused.


**ELF vs. VULCAN**

**Fandom:** Star Trek XI

**Genre:** A delectable main course of Humor, with a heaping helping of BFFery and a steaming side of Fluff. Finished off with a garnish of the finest Crack from the Southfarthing.

**Word Count: **Almost 6,000.

**Summary:** Bones and Jim discuss old twentieth-century literature as it pertains to Vulcan culture. Spock is not amused.

**Rating:** PG-13, for some language.

**Pairings:** none

**Spoilers:** Major events in _Star Trek XI_, and some minor details from various books by J.R.R. Tolkien.

**Warnings:** I think this should be fun for most people to read, but to be honest you probably need to have seen one film, at the very least: _The Fellowship of the Ring_. For optimum enjoyment, however, having read _The Lord of the Rings_ is the best. Knowing a bit of _The Silmarillion_ wouldn't hurt either. It also helps if you know a fair amount about Vulcan history and culture. In short, if you get the majority of the references in this story, you are a massive geekist. Be prepared to come to terms with this.

**Disclaimer:** _Star Trek_ and _The Lord of the Rings_ belong to the dearly departed Gene Roddenberry and J.R.R. Tolkein, respectively, and the various estates, trusts, and production companies that now own them. I'm receiving no money, credits, or coins for this story. Or mithril.

**A/N:** I can barely believe I wrote this, but my brain kept making the comparisons and I knew it had to come out. It was an interesting experience. I held a long battle in my head concerning the usage of the term 'epithet' versus 'kenning,' and once, whilst researching some details, I began to make up a song about various characters from _LOTR_ that culminated in crooning, "Gandalf is a BAMF!" before I realized it and stopped myself. I suppose this proves it's too late for me to have a life, but I do hope this brings people as much joy as it did me. :)

-o-o-o-o-

"Well, Jim, you're as good as new," said Dr. McCoy. "That's to say, you're as good as a new itch under the flippers of a Tusknate whore."

"You would know, Bones." Jim grinned at his CMO and hopped off the biobed. He was used to insults such as these, and anyway, Bones had a bit of a right to be irritated today. The _Enterprise_ had been sent on a mission to Gorax VII, a pre-warp planet, to look for a certain plant that another planet in the solar system was losing due to some sort of blight. This plant had a wide range of medicinal properties, so Starfleet had considered it an important enough mission for its exploring flagship. For the landing party Jim had chosen Lieutenant Sulu (since he loved plants and was good in a tight corner), Spock (since he was head science officer and interested in the project), Doctor M'Benga (for his medicinal knowledge), Ensigns Jeffreys and Slivovitz (for security), and himself (because he was the captain, and he wanted to tag along). They had found a couple promising plants to bring aboard, but not one of the astronauts themselves had come back uninjured.

The reason for this was because when the report from Starfleet had said, "pre-warp society," what it really meant was, "ragtag-tribal-alien-Neanderthals-who-are-handy-with-spears society." You can only pick off so many aliens with a phaser when they're charging you en masse and wildly wielding weapons, but Sulu did what he could with his collapsible katana while M'Benga collected what he could of the plants and Scotty beamed them the hell out of there. So, back on the _Enterprise _and getting his wound tended to, Jim got to hear Bones bitch about away missions, Jim, a member of his medical staff getting injured, Jim, officers who should be on the bridge and not in landing parties, Jim, alien life on godforsaken planets, and also Jim. The captain of the ship just let him do it as the doctor cleaned and patched up the slash on his chest, because he knew berating him was his revenge for making him worry so much. Actually, Jim was surprised Bones wasn't being meaner and keeping him behind to stew in his own juices on a biobed out of pure spite.

Well, he'd take a free pass where he could get it. Captain Kirk put on one of the spare regulation black shirts they kept in Sickbay. "Always a pleasure, Bones!" He clapped his friend on a blue-clad shoulder and looked at his first officer, who was sitting on the next biobed. "You good, Spock?"

The half-Vulcan, who was the last in line to get treated, raised an eloquent eyebrow. "I am perfectly adequate, thank you, Captain."

"Hmm." Jim crossed his arms and tilted his head. "You know I'd believe you a little more without the face paint," he said, referring to the green blood splattered on his cheek and still oozing from beneath the sterilized towel he was holding to the side of his head. Jim knew Spock had gotten clipped with a spear, but he wasn't sure of the extent of the damage. And of course, Spock being Vulcan and 'without feeling,' there was no real way of telling how bad it was just by asking, though Jim was sure he would've already been treated if it were really serious.

Bones huffed and shoved the captain out of his way, pulling a cart behind him. "Jim, just get out of my Sickbay and let me do my job. You've heard of jobs, haven't you?" The doctor stopped the cart and flipped down the break with his foot.

Jim peered over his shoulder at the wide array of shiny surgical implements and without thinking, reached for a particularly wicked-looking blade.

Bones smacked his hand. Hard. "Jim, goddammit!"

The captain backed away with his arms in the air. "Alright, alright. Just wanted to know if I'm getting my science officer back any time soon."

"Well," said the doctor, gently taking the towel out of Spock's hand. Picking up a small alcohol swab, he narrowed his eyes and tenderly dabbed a blood-drenched ear, the pointed tip of which was almost completely severed from the rest. "The cut looks even, which is lucky. It'll take some delicate work, but I should have him back on the bridge before the end of his shift."

Jim let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. He didn't know why the prospect of Spock losing part of one of his ears bothered him so much. The curved, pointy ears were just something that made Spock…Spock. "Did you hear that, Commander? Good news!"

One of the Vulcan's eyebrows twitched. "My inner ear has remained uninjured, despite the outer portion needing the attention of Dr. McCoy."

Spock was making jokes (or pointing out the logical fallacy in his statement, whatever), which probably meant he wasn't that bothered. "You're hilarious!" chuckled Jim. Spock blinked slowly.

"Jim, get the hell out of my Sickbay and stop harassing my patients. Now," Bones continued without missing a beat, "let's see what we can do about making sure you live to be an elf for another day." He picked up tiny clamps in one gloved hand and an instrument Jim couldn't identify in the other.

"I'm a Vulcan, not an elf, as you are well aware, Doctor," Spock replied easily, not giving any indication that Bones's more in depth examination of the wound was causing him any pain.

"You could have fooled me," said Bones, pulling out his Southern drawl. "These pointy ears look _damned_ elf-like."

Jim mentally rubbed his hands. _And so it begins! _He turned to Spock for his response.

"An illogical conclusion, Doctor, as I hail from a planet that never included diminutive, dwarf-like entities in the entirety of its mythology."

"Not all elves…" began Bones's retort, and Jim smiled at his two best friends. Spock loved pitting his logic against illogical intelligence, and Bones, well, he wanted Jim to stop harassing his patients because harassing patients was his duty as CMO. It meant he cared, anyway. The captain tuned out their familiar squabbling and turned on his heel- best to leave them to it. Winking at one of the nurses, he was all the way across Sickbay and just about to step out the door when Bones called, "Oh, Jim!" in a very mischievous-sounding, singsong voice.

Kirk hesitated.

The bickering between Bones and Spock was always hilarious- from the outside. Jim wasn't sure when it had evolved from barely-veiled hostility to a hardly-concealed habit that they both enjoyed, but one thing hadn't changed: if one James T. Kirk got involved, it could only end in three ways. One, Bones gives him a hypospray to the neck. Two, Spock gives him a nerve pinch to the neck. Three, they both get angry with him and join forces to his torment. And that, THAT was the one thing in the entire universe that Jim feared.

On the other hand, if Jim ignored Bones now, he might not get any premium gold label Southern whiskey the next time he asked for it. "Yes, Bones?" he answered, hiding his apprehension behind a winning grin. The sliding door, that had opened as he'd tried to make his exit, hissed shut behind him. He made his way back over to the chief medical officer.

"Spock has never read _The Lord of the Rings_. In fact, he hasn't read any Tolkien at all." Jim halted his progress, mouth agape. Bones looked back at him smugly. "Strange, isn't it? He's verbose and sarcastic; you'd think Spock would love him."

With an effort, Jim was able to close his mouth. The information just, just didn't compute. His Vulcan first officer was well-versed in the literature of many worlds, but most especially that of Earth. Jim _knew_ that. Just the other day he had overhead a conversation between Spock and Sulu about Alexandre Dumas whilst on the bridge. Hell, the first day they'd known each other Spock had quoted Sherlock Holmes to underscore the logic of his arguments. How could he _not_ know Tolkien?

Besides, practically the only luxury Jim allowed himself in his quarters was the presence of books, real books- piled on his desk, spilling off of shelves, crawling out from under his bed. PADDs were so impersonal. One of his earliest memories was of sitting on a couch with his older brother as their mother read them _The Prisoner of Azkaban_. His love of reading was probably the only reason his teachers passed him in high school. It would be embarrassing if people ever found out how well he knew Shakespeare, and curling up with a real, paper-and-ink book was a great way to unwind at the Academy after a long day of staring at formulae on a computer (and he was too tired to go out). What if- what if Spock only ever read literature on PADDs? What if he found real books illogical and inefficient? How could he possibly be friends with someone who didn't care for books? "Has he- has he even _heard_ of Tolkien?" Jim stuttered.

"Professor John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, born January third, 1892 according to the Standard Earth Calendar, in the once country of South Africa, now part of the United States of Africa," Spock recited before Bones could reply. "He invented his first language at the age of seven, a pidgin between French and Spanish. At the age of twenty-four he fought as a British soldier at the Battle of the Somme during Earth's First World War. He wrote and studied language and literature all his life, eventually becoming a professor at the prestigious University of Oxford. He was an important member of The Inklings, which was-"

"Okay, okay," said Jim, glancing at Bones to see if he was catching all of this. The doctor had resumed work on his patient, but judging by how his look of concentration was etched with smugness, he was definitely catching all of this. "So now that we've established he was a 20th-century badass, why haven't you read any of his works?"

The Vulcan's face didn't move a muscle, but something about the way he was sitting projected a vague discomfort. Of course, that could have been because Bones had begun the process of reattaching his ear. At length he answered, "_The Lord of the Rings_ was among my mother's favorite books."

Which should have given him even more reason to have read it. "…Okay?"

"…It was not among my father's."

"So what? You're gonna let your daddy tell ya what books you can read?" Bones groused.

Spock frowned very slightly. "Tolkien's work was a point of contention in my household."

Bones froze. Slowly he set down his instruments, peeled off his gloves, and threw them into the appropriate receptacle. Then, he burst out laughing. "Oh, I just bet it was a _point _of contention!"

"I fail to find this discussion humorous. Are you quite finished with my injury, Doctor?"

"No," said Bones, the same time Jim said, "Wait!" The captain looked back and forth between the two men. "Wait. What am I missing, here?"

"Elves, Jim. Elves. Aren't Vulcans like Elves?"

"If you have not completed the surgery then perhaps you should continue."

"Don't bitch at your doctor."

"Vulcans do not 'bitch'."

"Yeah, neither do Elves."

"Am I invisible, here?" huffed Kirk.

Spock's eyes flicked to Jim. "The light seems to be reflecting off of you in the normal manner, Captain."

"The hobgoblin over here is having a hissy because he was _wrong_." The doctor grinned. "He thought elves only helped Santa in our 'Earth mythology'."

"Ah," said Jim. He could help with that. "Well, long before that particular myth, elves, or the fey, or other equivalents, were thought of as tall and powerful in a variety of Northern European cultures. Tolkien based his Elves off of those."

"Indeed," Spock responded, in a toneless voice that nevertheless clearly implied he still knew more about Earth's history than the collective crew of the _Enterprise_ ever would.

"Still, though," said Jim. "Haven't you ever seen the films? There were three of them. They practically defined cinema in the first decade of the 21st century. They might be a couple hundred years old, but come on. They're classics! I mean, there are cultural references to them _everywhere_. How could you go around not noticing those?"

"That's right," agreed Bones, puttering with the materials on the cart. "Like when you hacked into the student network at Starfleet."

"Yeah! They must have tapped you to fix that, Spock," said Jim. "Remember when no one could log on to the Academy student network? All they could get when they put in their usernames and passwords was a video clip of a wizard?"

Spock blinked. "I do recall it. It was an old man shouting, 'you shall not pass'." The Vulcan narrowed his eyes at Jim. "We never found the culprit. Of course it was you. If that had been common knowledge then perhaps there would have been more failsafes in place for the Kobayashi Maru when you-"

"But Spock," Jim interrupted before the conversation could be redirected to that old argument, "don't you remember how most of the students just laughed and didn't really care or get angry? Because it was _hilarious_?"

"I did not find it humorous at all," said the Vulcan.

"He didn't get it, Bones," murmured Jim, horrified. "He didn't get it!"

"I know, Jim," the doctor sighed, shaking his head. Bones put on a new pair of gloves and picked up a different instrument. He pressed a button and it began to hum, blue lights flickering up and down its silver sides. "Now. Hold still, Elf."

"I have not moved, Doctor. And I am not an Elf."

"Elves aren't really a bad thing to be compared to, Spock," Jim reasoned. "It's better than being called a hobgoblin, isn't it?"

Spock stared.

"Isn't it?"

Bones smirked, though he never took his eyes off his hands. "What the good captain is trying to say, Spock, is that I've been delivering you compliments all this time."

"I would hardly term it a 'compliment.' You would not be pleased if I called you ancient names from Old Vulcan mythology. Like _a'kweth_, for example."

Before Bones could respond and the situation escalated further, Kirk spoke. "We're getting a little off track, here. Um." Jim looked from Bones, who was holding potentially harmful medical equipment, back to Spock, whose non-expression was hardening very subtly into an intense Vulcan glare. "Maybe…maybe you just shouldn't call him an Elf anymore, Bones," he hedged.

The doctor snorted. "Why not? He practically is one."

"I fail to see-"

"Okay, maybe you should finish his ear later-"

"Now, I'm not just talking about the pointy ears-"

"-how a Vulcan in any way resembles-"

"-because I think this discussion would-"

"-but it's the attitude, you know? Holier-"

"-a fictional Earth species that-"

"-be better out of reach of medical tools-"

"-than thou, and the longer life spans-"

"-was popularized by a professor approximately-"

"-can disembowel at 50 paces, wait WHAT?" squawked Jim.

"Longer life spans," repeated Bones.

Jim mulled that over for a second. "It's true, Spock. Elves do live longer than Humans. Of course, they're immortal, so it's a little different."

"The point stands," Bones maintained. The hands operating what Jim was beginning to term the Blue Blinky Thing stayed steady. Spock flicked his eyes over to Bones and back without moving his head. "You see, Elves don't die like Humans die. When Humans die it's still a mystery, yeah? But when Elves die, their souls go over to a different continent on the world with some fancy name, Valinor or some such, in a pretty hall where they keep existing under the watch of demigods."

"Bones! _Bones_. You're right!" Jim forgot the discomfort of his first officer in light of this revelation. He paced a little as he continued, "That's like Vulcans and their katras, right Spock? When you guys die, your katras are stored by the Vulcan elders or the people who've gone through the Kolinahr or whomever. That's…sort of like being a demigod. Because if you really practice you get mad psychic powers, right?"

"I took a seminar on xenoneurobiology at the Academy once. There are rumors that some Vulcans can develop telekinesis," added Bones.

"Shit, that's awesome!" said Kirk, momentarily put off-track. Vulcans were so _cool_. Then he went on, "Elves totally have psychic powers, too. Well, it's at least implied in the books that Galadriel can make people see things in their heads. In the movies, she speaks to the Fellowship telepathically. It's not quite like Vulcan telepathy, but _still_."

Spock's lips were the thinnest of lines. "Most of the katras of my people were lost with the implosion of Vulcan."

Jim cleared his throat awkwardly. Bones had told him not long after the Narada Incident (or so Starfleet called it) that all Vulcans were psychically connected, and when their planet was destroyed, all the survivors had actually _felt_ them die. He tugged at his shirtsleeves a little. He'd never really put together the fact that the Vulcans hadn't just felt six billion people die, but…completely…blink out of existence, including those who'd been long dead. What kind of scarring did that leave? _Not the kind that can be fixed by a dermal regenerator_, Jim thought grimly, as Bones picked up that instrument and began to use it. The doctor looked a little ill himself.

"Well," said the captain, unwilling to leave his Vulcan friend in such a dark mood (though being Vulcan, he 'did not have moods'), "Elves do lots of cool stuff! They build things that blend in with their surroundings instead of on top of them….They can walk on snow as if it were solid ground…and they're really wicked fighters. With knives and swords and long curvy spear things that I'm sure Sulu would know the name of. And bows and arrows! Elves are really…efficient," he finished, proud of having thought of the Vulcan compliment.

"I guess we can't use the walking-on-snow ability as an example, since Vulcans are from the desert," said Bones, "but because of their light step they're real quiet when they move. They can sneak up on you like a cat. Vulcans are descended from the sort of cat equivalent of your planet, isn't that right?"

"Affirmative," bit out Spock.

"Yeah, and they have good night vision, like you guys," Jim continued with the theme. "_And_ Elves don't have to sleep a lot like Humans do."

"Well, how about that, Spock?" grinned Bones. "Aren't you always telling me that 'Vulcans do not require eight hours of sleep to operate at full capacity, Doctor'?"

"But hey, archery is cool, right?" Jim interjected. Spock had just made an eyebrow twitch in a distinctly annoyed manner. "Do Vulcans have those kinds of weapons? And do you use them?"

Spock shifted his eyes from glaring at the wall to glaring at Jim. "Not since the Dark Days," he said ominously.

The humming of the regenerator in Bones's hand went silent. He and the captain exchanged looks, blinked, and doubled over, clutching each other for support. "Oh no- oh no, that's too much!" the doctor gasped.

"Did he say that? Did he really say it, Bones? Am I dreaming?" Their guffaws echoed in the large room and various medical personnel looked up from their tasks. Seeing who it was, they shook their heads and went back to work. There was never any accounting for the most superior officers on their ship.

"What is humorous, exactly? I was simply referring to the days before the logical philosophy of Surak," said Spock, not quite managing to keep an edge out of his voice.

Jim noticed the warning for what it was, but he couldn't quite help himself. "I know what you meant," he assured the Vulcan, trying to stifle the uncaptainly giggles escaping his control, "but it was just like when Haldir was talking about, haha, when Haldir said, the Dwarves and the Elves-"

"Wait, Jim! Wait," commanded Bones with sudden authority, ducking out from under the captain's arm and shoving so that he was also facing Spock. "Let's say you had one of those Vulcan bow and arrow get-ups. Then I would draw a sword, and threaten to chop off Jim's head. What would you do?"

"_Brilliant_," Jim lauded him breathily.

Spock's eyelids fluttered a couple times; it looked like he was having trouble deciding between his icy ire at the illogic of his friends, and his ever-present curiosity. "That is a most irregular query," he finally said. "While I admit that you frequently threaten the captain with bodily harm, why would either of us be carrying ancient weaponry?"

"Hypothetically, Spock!" shouted Jim, jumping up and down with glee. "Answer the question! Answer the question!"

Spock looked from Jim back to McCoy.

"Come on, Spock. And I would really, really mean it. I might actually kill him this time. I'm about to lop his head off! What would you do?"

He and the captain stared at Spock with such intensity, that the Vulcan finally relented. "Well, Doctor, I must tell you that it would be folly to try and injure the captain, because you would die before your stroke fell."

"Holy shit, holy shit, Bones!" Jim shrieked. The two Humans again draped their arms across each other's shoulders to prevent themselves from keeling over with laughter. "This is the best day of my life! Is this being recorded? Are the Sickbay cams picking up on this? Bones! This is essential to the continuation of my happiness!"

"Jim, I, Jim! I don't know!" Bones wiped tears from his eyes, still shaking as he tried to clamp down on his mirth. "He's got to be joshing us, Jim. The word choice! The exact word choice!"

"Vulcans do not 'josh,' whatever that Terran expression means," retorted Spock. This time there was a most definite thread of irritation in his tone, and his dark eyes flashed against the blood-spatter.

"I know!" crowed Jim, standing upright by using Bones as leverage. "I know! Vulcans don't use words like 'josh' and Elves don't either! They're fucking articulate motherfuckers!"

"As I perceive you are not in this moment."

Kirk knew then, with the absence of the word 'captain,' that he had just crossed the buoy barrier into dangerous, nerve-pinching waters, but at this point he didn't care. It was all just too perfect. "Spoooock," he said. "Don't be that way! Vulcans are totally like Elves! See? They have that biting humor, too!"

"Yeah, they say that sarcastic shit with the straightest face. Never crack a smile," added Bones, himself beaming.

"Oh, wait, Bones. Oh wait, Bones, nooooo." Jim gripped his friend by the shoulders with a sinking feeling. He stared at his mud-splattered shoes for a moment before finding the courage to look the doctor in the eye. It was difficult to admit, but he had to say it- for great science. "Bones. I might have found a flaw in our comparison."

The doctor grew immediately concerned. "What is it, Jim?"

The captain bit his lip. "The Elves of Rivendell are sometimes described as…capricious. And often…merry. Especially in _The Hobbit_."

"By golly, you're right, Jim!" Bones stroked his chin thoughtfully, for all the universe looking like he was contemplating a complex medical issue. Spock was, for the moment, forgotten. "But not the Elves of Lothlórien. Jim, some of the Elves, like Galadriel and others in Lothlórien, are the last of the High Elves, the ones who're from Valinor or are descended from them! They're much more highfalutin and serious."

"Bones, that's genius!" Jim exclaimed.

"I know. Thank you, Jim."

"Because then the Elves of Rivendell and Mirkwood are totally the ones who stayed in Middle-Earth which means they're totally more like the other races!" Jim gesticulated wildly as he continued. "So _that_ means, that the Vulcans who are like, good Vulcans, and followed Surak, or whatever, are like the Elves of Lothlórien who keep themselves really isolated and shit, and the Vulcans who are more lax and like, were born on other planets or something, are like the Elves of Rivendell!"

"Except for Elrond, I suppose," Bones mused. "He's pretty serious most of the time. And he did go to Valinor, because…because he was actually partially Human!" The doctor snapped his fingers. "That's why he went! He had to choose one life or the other- and he chose to be an Elf."

Jim blinked. "Bones. Do you realize that Elrond has an epithet? _Do you know what that epithet is_?"

Bones thought for a bit, then shook his head. "I can't recall. What is it?"

"Halfelven, Bones," Jim said, voice filled with awe. "_Elrond Halfelven_."

Dr. McCoy gaped for a moment. Then, dimly at first, a wild light began to gleam in his eyes, mirroring the feral joy in Jim's own. In unison they turned to fully face the first officer of the USS _Enterprise_, who was still sitting on the edge of his biobed, in the same position as when this had all started. Beaming and crazed, almost reverent, aware of the awesomeness of the realization and with some disbelief, they said as one: "_SPOCK HALFVULCAN_."

Then they waited expectantly for the praise that would surely come after their impressive leaps of logic.

Slowly, carefully, Spock stood up from the bed and straightened his uniform, made somewhat stiff by the green blood that had dried as dark splotches on the normally pristine blue. "Gentlemen," he said, "I do not have to sit here and listen to this discussion any longer. It is illogical and, furthermore, it is uninteresting. Good day."

He moved as if to leave, but Bones put up a hand to stop him. "Call it illogical all you want, Spock, but you can't tell me you didn't find it interesting."

He cocked his head slightly in challenge. "Why is that, Doctor?"

"Because I finished your ear over five minutes ago, and you still sat there!" Bones smirked in his triumph. "Halfvulcan," he added.

Spock's eyes flicked from Bones to Jim, then back again. When he began to move, Jim only had the time to think, _It was totally worth it_, before his first officer performed the infrequently executed and rarely witnessed frontal assault double nerve pinch to take down two of the highest-ranking officers on the ship.

Nurse Chapel told them later that she'd already prepared biobeds for them to sleep it off.

-o-o-o-o-

_SIX MONTHS LATER_

-o-o-o-o-

"Well," said Jim. "This mission is now officially a complete clusterfuck. I'm putting that in the Captain's Log."

His two companions, Bones and Spock, each conveyed their disdain for his understatement by raising an eyebrow. The three Starfleet officers were standing inside a cave near its only exit- well, as close as they could. A large drift of snow trailed into the cavern, almost completely blocking the entrance. The captain had just scrambled up the snowy pile to see if it was only a hill they had to overcome, but no dice. "Not only do we not have communicators, but it looks like the blizzard buried _everything_." He promptly sank into the fluffy snow and tumbled down toward his friends' feet.

Jim grinned at the eyebrow treatment he was getting, despite the situation. He raised both hands to them from where he was on the stone floor. "Up?"

Bones rolled his eyes and Spock's eyebrow went up even further, but each offered him a gloved hand, both of which Jim took and jumped back to his feet. Then Bones smacked him upside the head. The sound of his glove on Jim's hood made a dull thump that stubbornly refused to echo. "You listen to me, Jim Kirk. There's only so much I can bring along in my travelling medkit. It includes all-purpose bandages, hypos for several common space maladies, a couple packs of protein nibs – which we already ate – a flask of whiskey (for medicinal purposes) – which we already drank – and COMMON SENSE. It does NOT include provisions for a long winter, or, you know, hot cocoa and three large beds with down comforters. Gee. I wonder where we could have gotten something like that. Oh! I know!" He put his hands on his cheeks in mock surprise. "At the palace! Which we were kicked out of! After they destroyed our communicators! And why? Why was this, Captain James Tiberius Kirk?"

Jim blushed and began to vigorously brush the snow off his coat, muttering.

"I'm sorry, Jim. I didn't hear that. Did you say it was because you couldn't keep it in your pants? Because that's why, Jim!"

"Her skin was lavender, Bones. Lavender!" The young captain paused. "At least…I think it was a she…How many genders did you say their species has, Spock?"

"I don't care if she was all the colors of the rainbow and had ten tentacles to pleasure you with!" Bones growled. "Stay. Away. From the offspring. Of the prime minister. Who is your host." The doctor punctuated his suggestion with repeated prods to Jim's chest.

"No one told me that's who it was!" Jim retorted, thinking that perhaps the silent treatment he'd received from both his officers the night before was preferable after all. At least Spock hadn't piped up yet. Someone still loved him.

"I, too, agree," Spock chimed in. (Or not.) "While it is none of our business what you do when not on duty, it is only logical for you to refrain from amorous relations with members of a species with whom we are, diplomatically, trying to set parameters on behalf of Starfleet and indeed, the Federation."

"Et tu, Spockus?" pouted Jim.

"We are in quite the predicament, Captain," the Vulcan responded calmly. "We found ourselves wholly unprepared for the sudden onset of yesterday's blizzard. This cave has proven to be a satisfactory shelter, but Dr. McCoy is right. We do not have our communicators. We are out of provisions. We did not bring phasers due to the diplomatic nature of the mission, and therefore cannot use them to possibly melt a way through the snowdrift."

"And it's all your fault, Jim, per usual." Bones sighed and seemed to deflate, his slouch visible even in his enormous, fluffy, Starfleet-issued winter coat. "We've probably been here well over twelve hours-"

"Fifteen hours, thirty-six minutes, and twenty-seven seconds," provided Spock.

Bones ignored him easily. "-and we're out of food. We can eat the snow for water, but that won't help in keeping our body temperatures up and these coats aren't going to keep us warm forever." The doctor rubbed his forehead beneath the synthfur that lined his hood. "And we've got a Vulcan, who's used to dry desert heat. We've got to get out of here, Jim."

Spock stood up straighter, if that was even possible, and clasped his hands behind his back. "While your understanding of medicine is mostly unparalleled, you seem to fail to grasp the basics of climatology and ecosystems. Deserts are quite cold during the night. As a Vulcan I will have no more trouble than you in withstanding the current weather." McCoy shared a look with Jim and an understanding passed between them- it wasn't _wet_ cold that Vulcans ever had to deal with. Spock continued, "If you have any self-powered instruments, Doctor, we might be able to alter them in order to melt some sort of path."

"If Vulcans are so great at withstanding the cold, Spock, you might be able to use your boiling body heat to better effect," Bones grumped. "Either that or we can wait for this planet's sun to melt the snow for us. If we live that long. Unless it magically comes down from the sky to actually heat the damn place. Why don't you give us a calculation for that, Spock? How close would it have to get?"

Kirk shook his head. "No use arguing. We'll just have to start heading back toward the city – I'm sure the blizzard has kept everyone inside, so we shouldn't be in danger from the natives – and hope to run into one of the search parties that Scotty should have already sent."

"There's no way we're going to get through all that," the doctor objected, "not without snowshoes. It's got to be eight or nine feet deep." He gestured toward the snow spilling into their haven. "It's not humanly possible."

"Precisely," said Spock, and without further ado he climbed up the drift and swiftly pulled himself out of the cave.

McCoy and Jim lunged after him, but weren't quick enough to grab a hold of even his boots. Shouting obscenities, they called for the first officer and clawed up as well as they could on the shifting slope. The Vulcan had disappeared from view, and a horrible image loomed in Jim's head of his friend, with his higher body density, having fallen through the snow and unable to get back to them, soon succumbing to hypothermia with his Vulcan sensibilities, his nose and pointy ears turned bright green from the frostbite, shivering and helpless-

Finally their flailing limbs pulled them to the top of the cave entrance and they peered out onto the blinding, brilliant white expanse before them. And there was Spock with his hood thrown back, standing tall and dark against the sparkling brightness around him, gazing into the distance.

"Spock?" cried Bones incredulously. He'd obviously been thinking along the same lines as Jim.

At his voice, the Vulcan turned and stepped lightly back toward them, his boots just barely leaving indentations in the glittering snow. Delicately he lowered himself to one knee in front of their faces, partially visible between the lip of the snowbank and the top of the cave. "Doctor?" he replied passively.

"How di- Did y-" Bones stuttered. "Dammit, man!"

"What I think he's trying to say is, what the _fuck_, Spock?" shouted Jim. "You could've gotten buried! Did you know you'd be able to do that?"

"Of course," replied Spock.

"But there wasn't any snow on Vulcan, and nothing like this ever in San Francisco. How could you _possibly_ know that?" said Bones.

Spock raised his eyebrow. "Once the question had been asked, it was only logical to follow the line of inquiry to its conclusion," he stated reasonably. "The wintry hills of Pontillius VIII offered me adequate opportunity for a sufficient amount of practice some months ago."

Jim shook the odd image of a snowshoeing Vulcan from his head, and tried to grasp what Spock was really saying. "So…" he began, "did you just perform the experiment, or did you actually read _The Lord of the Rings_?"

The Vulcan looked at them both for a moment, then in one elegant and measured motion he stood and walked away.

"Wait!" Bones shouted after him. "Where in the hell do you think you're going?"

"'I go to find the sun!'" Spock threw lightly over his shoulder. Then the Vulcan graced them with a small, sly smile, and it was as if the nearest star had already descended from the heavens to reach them.

-o-o-o-o-

Well, everybody, I hope you enjoyed! I think finishing this story officially puts me among the ranks of biggest geeks in the world.

Also, what Jim described as the "long curvy spear things that I'm sure Sulu would know the name of" are, in fact, glaives. Just in case you were wondering.

And Sulu would totally know that, too.


End file.
